History of Nursing

By pmulder

  • First vaccination (small pox)

    small pox vaccination small pox vaccination

  • First surgical procedure using anesthesia

  • Semmelweis proposed handwashing before caring for women in labor and after birth

  • Nightingale Nurse Training

    Nightingale Nurse Training

    Nightingale completed nursing training at Kaiserswerth
  • Nightingale in Turkey

    Nightingale in Turkey

    Nightingale arrived in Turkey with 38 nurses to care for soldiers wounded in the Crimean war.
  • First English Training School for Nurses

    First English Training School for Nurses

    Nightingale started the first English nurse training school at St. Thomas' Hospital in London.

  • Application of germ theory to surgery

  • First practical thermometer

  • First sphygmomanometer for practice clinical use

  • Columbia University

    Columbia University

    Columbia University School of Nursing established.
  • Henry Street Settlement

    Henry Street Settlement

    Lillian Wald established the Henry Street Settlement in New York, first formal public health nursing practice.

  • First Use of X-rays in Battlefield Medicine

  • American Journal of Nursing

    American Journal of Nursing first issue published.

  • First school nurse in the US

    Lina Rogers becomes the first school nurse in the US.

  • US Army School of Nursing

    US Army School of Nursing started

  • First Use of insulin to treat diabetes

    Leonard Thompson

  • Goldmark Report

    Goldmark report recommends schools of nursing be associated with colleges and universities.

  • Frontier Nursing Service

    Frontier Nursing Service formed to provide rural nursing and maternity care.

  • Pap smear available for screening

    First used in 1928, efficacy proven in 1941

  • First time the iron long was used to save life of a child with polio

  • First Doctoral Degree in Nursing

    Teachers College, Columbia University and New York University offer the Doctor of Education Degree (EdD) for nurses.

  • Human blood storage

    first time that human blood was stored

  • Rh disease identified

    Rh factor discovered in blood

  • African American Nurses Join Army Nurse Corps

    African American nurses allowed to join Army Nurse Corps and care for German prisoners of war and soldiers in foreign countries.

  • Cadet Nursing Corps Established

    Cadet Nursing Corps established, nursing school tuition and educational costs paid in exchange for commitment to serve during all of World War II.

  • First year penicillin was widely available to treat humans

    Was discovered in 1928 and as widely available in mid to late 1940s.

  • Philip Levine given award for identifying Rh disease and cause in newborns

    Dr. Landsteiner as well as John Mahoney of the United States Marine Hospital and Alexander Wiener of the New York Medical Examiner’s Officer

  • Army & Navy Nurse Corps Officers

    Nurses given the status of full commissioned officers in the Army and Navy Nurse Corps.

  • Segregation of Military Nurses Ends

    Segregation of African American nurses in the Army and Navy Nursing Corps ends.

  • Oral contraceptives

    created by planned parenthood federation of America

  • ADN Degree

    ADN nursing degree programs started.

  • Journal of Nursing Research

    Journal of Nursing Research first published.

  • Kidney Transplant

    First successful transplant

  • Men in the Nursing Corps

    Men allowed to enter military nursing corps

  • First Doctor of Nursing Science Graduates

    Boston University designed the first program
    to deal with the clinical practice of nursing and created the doctor of nursing science degree, with the first graduate in 1963.

  • Non-invasive fetal heart monitor

  • First Nurse Practitioner

    First legally recognized nurse practitioner license in Idaho.

  • First human born by in vitro fertilization

  • First gene therapy clinical trial

  • First use of a vaccine against COVID-19